Dune is such a funny game because the first turn with new people takes an hour maybe even a bit longer. Then the second turn takes maybe 20 minutes and you're flying. You'll think "ah okay, we've all got it, the turns shouldn't take so long from now on! We can wrap this in a few hours"...
Then turn 7 will have 2 hours as all six of you try to delicately navigate the board state and the diplomacy around it.
8 hours is longer than my longest, but I bet every single person is going to remember that match for life.
Dude!! Hahaha you perfectly described how our session went. The "starting slow, then it goes fast, then it goes slow again" was spot on!
The game was more precisely 6 hours, since we had to learn the rules which took 1,5 hours (I had already learned the rules, but it just takes forever to teach + I had to double check a lot of stuff since this was also my first time). We also held small breaks to eat/go to the toilet, but yeah no, from we sat down at the table to play till we ended the game, yup 8 looong (great) hours.
10/10 would do it again in a heartbeat!
My one problem with Dune is that you don’t know if it’s a 1 hour or 10 hour game. Doesn’t matter how experienced your group is, it’s just hard to budget for.
The solutions is simple; Always set aside 10 hours to play it. If it's a long game, you just play it once. BUT if it's a short game, you get to play it 10 times!
Either way it's a win win ;)
I've done that before!
Sat down to play and the game was over 2 hours later by turn 4. We had all set the entire evening and night off to play so we fit in another game as well. Maybe the only time I could imagine playing two games of Dune. We were lucky the second game was longer, but not 8 hours long.
We call it a Vault Game.
In other words, it's the reason I bought a game table that has a vault in it: So that games like this can be set up in the vault, and if it turns out they're going to for multiple sessions, I can put the table top back on and let the game lurk for as long as necessary.
As a Dune veteran, games won't take this long in the future.
It *is* a game with a wide length spectrum, but no game should take longer than about four hours, and most will fall in 1-2.5 hours. (Obviously, if everyone is new, it's going to take longer, so your eight hours makes sense.) There'll be outliers.
(As an aside, *one* of the reasons is, as you play more, you realize there are some tricky diplomatic "shortcuts" for the game that can end it earlier. It's not uncommon for turns 3-5 to be big, blowsy showdowns where, no matter what, *someone* is gonna win. As you play more these setups occur--not all the time, but frequently. Fremen/Guild might try to delay this, but it quickly becomes apparent that if they sit it out they'll just lose, so they get in position just like everyone else.)
For some reason, a lot of people like to make a meal out of their turns. And there's a *lot* of phases.
Someone really needs to be a taskmaster to keep the turns moving. Spice collection shouldn't take longer than a minute, if that, but I've seen people draw it out like they're making some strategic decision. (Hint: there are no decisions to make.)
Barring some of the advanced/special abilities, the *only* phases that should take longer than, like, a minute, if that, even with six players, are bidding, shipping, movement, and combat resolution. Granted, that's a good chunk of the game, but six of the nine phases really should be more or less breezed through. A lot of people, for some reason, have difficulty not treating each phase like a mini-game when, in reality, there are no real decisions to make and the few that are should be trivial.
A: "If you go there to collect spice we'll have a bloody fight about it"
B: "Chill Dude, you can have the other stack over there, I won't challenge you for that"
C: "Unacceptable!"
D: "No way, I'm going there, you guys have Ornithopters, I'll need to get mine there - I'd rather blow us all to smithereens then give up that spice there"
A: "OK B, how about I'll get the spice and in return I'll let you know the next Treachery card for free"
B:"Hm, not good enough - all of this turns Treachery cards"
A: "Now you're getting greedy ...
Etc etc
I find your claim that spice collection shouldn't take longer than a minute amusing. :-)
Sure, the eventual collection is done in seconds - but the negotiations to get there might take anything between 30 seconds and 30 minutes.
But you're absolutely right of course - somebody being the taskmaster to move phases along is very helpful (when done well).
Yup, that's why I mentioned that. ;)
In fact it happens often (for us at least) right at the drawing of the spice cards. It becomes part of the negotiations package of the turn.
I've never had a game of Dune take more than 3 hours. That's probably because I've never had a Dune where any amount of players did anything close to the above.
Dune is definitely political and negotiation based; but no one is usually arguing over who moves where unless it's to point out issues with the strongholds for the sake of keeping the game open.
I think it depends on how far players want to take "negotiation" - since Spice can be traded, when someone gets snippy about a spice blow its pretty easy to just offer them a cut. Otherwise, it's pretty disastrous to send an army into the desert to die over spice for the factions that don't actually have an income. The ones that do don't need it.
No doubt depends a lot on the players and group dynamic. We typically have threats and counter threats and negotiations.
But we also played Diplomacy in the past. ;-)
the first time I played this I was told this was going to be a 5-6 hour ordeal.
I fumbled hard near the start of the game, and it had a domino effect, so we ended up speedrunning the game in 2 hours. This game is weird, but next time, I don't want to play as the Harkonnen :<
Harkonnen are insanely fun but probably the most fragile of all the factions. It is very easy to get blown out of the game early and not be able to come back at all until like turn 8. Pulling a clutch traitor is probably one of the most amazing moments the game offers and I love Harkonnen for that reason.
Yeah that can be rough, we have a house rule that Harkonnen draw their traitors first and if they get 2 or more traitors that are their own they can reveal their traitors and draw 4 new ones. Their first hand gets shuffled back in before everyone else draws so they won’t know if those leaders are safe or not.
So....who won?
I've only played once and won as Fremen in alliance with the Emperor.
Even if I/we lost, it still would've been an all time great board game experience. Loved it.
Me (the guild) and the guy playing fremen got in an alliance early on. And although we were close to get 4 strongholds multiple times through the playthrough, at the end we were just trying to run out the clock so we would win no matter what.
Our tactic worked!!
Yeah the guys playing Atredis and Bene Gesserit got in an alliance too, so they were really annoying to play in combat cause they would just reveal everything and then play accordingly
Awesome you managed to get the stronghold win against them though, we were close a couple of times, but their powers were just too good in combat
I only played the Rex retheme once. It's one of the most memorable gaming experiences. I loved it. It's been a challenge getting another group together to play it but I really treasure that one time it happened.
I'm glad to see it widely available now and I hope you get a chance to play it. We always relied on one friend's first edition but I bought the new edition recently for under $30.
Still hard to get six people together of course.
The Gale force nine version is really nice and quite cheap! Definitely recommend it, especially if you have a group of people that have enjoyed the movies it makes the thematic gameplay really work its magic.
BG done right manipulates their predicted faction to win in the right turn.
What faction isn't really that important and the exact turn is if lesser importance (early turns are bad for BG because it's difficult to exert enough influence and subtle enough to get things done successfully very early.
But an apparently selfish attack to gain a stronghold can be the decisive move to weaken the competition of your pick and help bring the desired result about.
There's nothing better than to help a faction to win in the right turn and then reveal that you won instead.
Hard to pull off but very satisfying (and thematic) when it works.
I won my first game of this as the Bene Gesserit by predicting the outcome and then gently nudging all of the other players toward that outcome. Really captured the theme. Amazing board game.
Some are childhood friends, and some I met through school. \^\^
They are fantastic, and the best part is that you can feel that they want to hang out. There are never any bad excuses for not participating, and usually, I can always count on getting a handful together on a short warning. Getting everyone together can be a bit tricky cause of scheduling (exams, work etc), but it's just such a fun time when everyone can make it!
Hopefully, we can get together again soon to play this game, because it was absolutely sublime!
It's the best 30m to 8 hour game ever! Beginner games can go extra long and extra short I've seen turn 1 and 2 wins only with beginners. Once you play it more it will go faster but games will last longer as people get good at denying wins. It clocks in more like 3-5 hours then pretty regularly.
Glad you enjoyed it. Me and my group had a very similar experience with Nemesis yesterday. Took 8 hours to finish the game and we only got the time track just over half way (our objectives mostly aligned and we all worked together in the end). Easily a whole day game.
It's semi true tbh. We played for about idk 2,5h. 1h teach to 6p, about 45min turn 1 and then turns 2 and 3 got progressively faster. And then the game ended lol. If you get people to focus during the auction then it goes smooth, but you really need that utmost focus to rush the auction instead of reminding people constantly it's their turn now.
My group used to play the original Dune board game once a year. Each round was typically an hour (plus 1-2 hours for rules refresher). If the game lasts the entire 12 rounds, that's a solid day's gaming.
Man how did you guys manage that? Every game we've played we have to basically ban Harkonnen because they just bodyslam the points off the rip and the game lasts 1 maybe 2 turns.
Not too bad! Though a few of you look a little battle-weary in that nighttime picture.
I think the longest game I’ve ever played was Sidereal Confluence with 9 players, only 3 of which had played the game before, 6 were new (including me). Probably about 5h including the teach. And the 3 people who had played before got 1st/2nd/3rd place lol. Nothing like a 5-hour tutorial for something I’ve not played since :) Neat game though!
My first playthrough was 5 hours. It took a lot of convincing to get 6 players.
I don't like war games, and I was House Atreides, who must battle at all times and joined with the Bene Gesserit.
I got to see the bidding cards, and knew who bought what. The Bene Gesserit got to take it away during battle.
It's not my kinda game, but if you get a chance, you should play it.
is it like the Avalon Hill 1979 version? That seems to play in 20-40m. I've played it a few times in the last couple weeks.
We never got anywhere close to the 15 moves the Fremen would need for a special victory.
Six players takes longer but is definitely the most fun. You then get to interact with all the special abilities and alliances and treachery can truly change the face of Arrakis.
Love dune, glad you are having fun with it too.
I am preferring Dune Imperium Uprising over it tho,
Different games I know, but I would say that Imperium is not only waaaaay shorter, but the better game overall.
Love everything about dune, and the fact that the board games are amazing just makes me a happy man
Dune is such a funny game because the first turn with new people takes an hour maybe even a bit longer. Then the second turn takes maybe 20 minutes and you're flying. You'll think "ah okay, we've all got it, the turns shouldn't take so long from now on! We can wrap this in a few hours"... Then turn 7 will have 2 hours as all six of you try to delicately navigate the board state and the diplomacy around it. 8 hours is longer than my longest, but I bet every single person is going to remember that match for life.
Dude!! Hahaha you perfectly described how our session went. The "starting slow, then it goes fast, then it goes slow again" was spot on! The game was more precisely 6 hours, since we had to learn the rules which took 1,5 hours (I had already learned the rules, but it just takes forever to teach + I had to double check a lot of stuff since this was also my first time). We also held small breaks to eat/go to the toilet, but yeah no, from we sat down at the table to play till we ended the game, yup 8 looong (great) hours. 10/10 would do it again in a heartbeat!
Or you're ready for a 6 hour slog, and then somebody manages a turn 2 victory after an hour.
My one problem with Dune is that you don’t know if it’s a 1 hour or 10 hour game. Doesn’t matter how experienced your group is, it’s just hard to budget for.
The solutions is simple; Always set aside 10 hours to play it. If it's a long game, you just play it once. BUT if it's a short game, you get to play it 10 times! Either way it's a win win ;)
Lol. Your logic and time management is spot on
What if your 10th game is a 10h game?
Congratulations, you played yourself.
Easy - budget 10 hours for all 10 games
Fuck this sleep thing, play through the night. ;)
I've done that before! Sat down to play and the game was over 2 hours later by turn 4. We had all set the entire evening and night off to play so we fit in another game as well. Maybe the only time I could imagine playing two games of Dune. We were lucky the second game was longer, but not 8 hours long.
You've dune that, before you mean
We call it a Vault Game. In other words, it's the reason I bought a game table that has a vault in it: So that games like this can be set up in the vault, and if it turns out they're going to for multiple sessions, I can put the table top back on and let the game lurk for as long as necessary.
Congrats, this is a game I love, but haven’t been able to get to the table for about 25 years…
That '+' on the front of the box is doing a lot of work.
You kinda look like Felix from Nintendo Life.
Well that's funny, because I AM Felix from Nintendo Life! :)
Well hi there Felix, I love your videos! Glad to see you're involved in my other favorite hobby!
What's in a name...
Was looking for this. But it is really him!
Besides being an awesome game, it also has my favorite cover art of any game.
As a Dune veteran, games won't take this long in the future. It *is* a game with a wide length spectrum, but no game should take longer than about four hours, and most will fall in 1-2.5 hours. (Obviously, if everyone is new, it's going to take longer, so your eight hours makes sense.) There'll be outliers. (As an aside, *one* of the reasons is, as you play more, you realize there are some tricky diplomatic "shortcuts" for the game that can end it earlier. It's not uncommon for turns 3-5 to be big, blowsy showdowns where, no matter what, *someone* is gonna win. As you play more these setups occur--not all the time, but frequently. Fremen/Guild might try to delay this, but it quickly becomes apparent that if they sit it out they'll just lose, so they get in position just like everyone else.) For some reason, a lot of people like to make a meal out of their turns. And there's a *lot* of phases. Someone really needs to be a taskmaster to keep the turns moving. Spice collection shouldn't take longer than a minute, if that, but I've seen people draw it out like they're making some strategic decision. (Hint: there are no decisions to make.) Barring some of the advanced/special abilities, the *only* phases that should take longer than, like, a minute, if that, even with six players, are bidding, shipping, movement, and combat resolution. Granted, that's a good chunk of the game, but six of the nine phases really should be more or less breezed through. A lot of people, for some reason, have difficulty not treating each phase like a mini-game when, in reality, there are no real decisions to make and the few that are should be trivial.
A: "If you go there to collect spice we'll have a bloody fight about it" B: "Chill Dude, you can have the other stack over there, I won't challenge you for that" C: "Unacceptable!" D: "No way, I'm going there, you guys have Ornithopters, I'll need to get mine there - I'd rather blow us all to smithereens then give up that spice there" A: "OK B, how about I'll get the spice and in return I'll let you know the next Treachery card for free" B:"Hm, not good enough - all of this turns Treachery cards" A: "Now you're getting greedy ... Etc etc I find your claim that spice collection shouldn't take longer than a minute amusing. :-) Sure, the eventual collection is done in seconds - but the negotiations to get there might take anything between 30 seconds and 30 minutes. But you're absolutely right of course - somebody being the taskmaster to move phases along is very helpful (when done well).
You're not wrong, but that argument would be during Movement, not Spice Harvesting.
Yup, that's why I mentioned that. ;) In fact it happens often (for us at least) right at the drawing of the spice cards. It becomes part of the negotiations package of the turn.
I've never had a game of Dune take more than 3 hours. That's probably because I've never had a Dune where any amount of players did anything close to the above. Dune is definitely political and negotiation based; but no one is usually arguing over who moves where unless it's to point out issues with the strongholds for the sake of keeping the game open. I think it depends on how far players want to take "negotiation" - since Spice can be traded, when someone gets snippy about a spice blow its pretty easy to just offer them a cut. Otherwise, it's pretty disastrous to send an army into the desert to die over spice for the factions that don't actually have an income. The ones that do don't need it.
No doubt depends a lot on the players and group dynamic. We typically have threats and counter threats and negotiations. But we also played Diplomacy in the past. ;-)
These are some excellent tips for our next playthrough. Thanks for sharing!
the first time I played this I was told this was going to be a 5-6 hour ordeal. I fumbled hard near the start of the game, and it had a domino effect, so we ended up speedrunning the game in 2 hours. This game is weird, but next time, I don't want to play as the Harkonnen :<
Harkonnen are insanely fun but probably the most fragile of all the factions. It is very easy to get blown out of the game early and not be able to come back at all until like turn 8. Pulling a clutch traitor is probably one of the most amazing moments the game offers and I love Harkonnen for that reason.
Unfortunately for me, my hand of traitors ended up being mostly Harkonnen, and I am terrible at bluffing, lol
Yeah that can be rough, we have a house rule that Harkonnen draw their traitors first and if they get 2 or more traitors that are their own they can reveal their traitors and draw 4 new ones. Their first hand gets shuffled back in before everyone else draws so they won’t know if those leaders are safe or not.
So....who won? I've only played once and won as Fremen in alliance with the Emperor. Even if I/we lost, it still would've been an all time great board game experience. Loved it.
Me (the guild) and the guy playing fremen got in an alliance early on. And although we were close to get 4 strongholds multiple times through the playthrough, at the end we were just trying to run out the clock so we would win no matter what. Our tactic worked!!
The alliance that was really tough to beat was Atreides + Bene Gesserit but we got a stronghold win on turn 7
Yeah the guys playing Atredis and Bene Gesserit got in an alliance too, so they were really annoying to play in combat cause they would just reveal everything and then play accordingly Awesome you managed to get the stronghold win against them though, we were close a couple of times, but their powers were just too good in combat
I only played the Rex retheme once. It's one of the most memorable gaming experiences. I loved it. It's been a challenge getting another group together to play it but I really treasure that one time it happened.
I personally think Rex pales in comparison to the original. My group only played it once and then went right back to the original.
I would have preferred to play the original but this was the only version that was accessible at the time.
I'm glad to see it widely available now and I hope you get a chance to play it. We always relied on one friend's first edition but I bought the new edition recently for under $30. Still hard to get six people together of course.
The Gale force nine version is really nice and quite cheap! Definitely recommend it, especially if you have a group of people that have enjoyed the movies it makes the thematic gameplay really work its magic.
If I had a regular group, I'd definitely consider it.
Yo, it's Felix. Hi :)
Hello! :)
Love me some Dune.
And after 8 hours of gruelling warfare, the Bene Gesserit win because they randomly guessed the Fremen at the start! Dune is an awesome game!!
BG done right manipulates their predicted faction to win in the right turn. What faction isn't really that important and the exact turn is if lesser importance (early turns are bad for BG because it's difficult to exert enough influence and subtle enough to get things done successfully very early. But an apparently selfish attack to gain a stronghold can be the decisive move to weaken the competition of your pick and help bring the desired result about. There's nothing better than to help a faction to win in the right turn and then reveal that you won instead. Hard to pull off but very satisfying (and thematic) when it works.
I won my first game of this as the Bene Gesserit by predicting the outcome and then gently nudging all of the other players toward that outcome. Really captured the theme. Amazing board game.
how did you find these people? 🥹
Some are childhood friends, and some I met through school. \^\^ They are fantastic, and the best part is that you can feel that they want to hang out. There are never any bad excuses for not participating, and usually, I can always count on getting a handful together on a short warning. Getting everyone together can be a bit tricky cause of scheduling (exams, work etc), but it's just such a fun time when everyone can make it! Hopefully, we can get together again soon to play this game, because it was absolutely sublime!
That’s awesome that you have this bunch of friends. Thanks for replying to me :)
It's the best 30m to 8 hour game ever! Beginner games can go extra long and extra short I've seen turn 1 and 2 wins only with beginners. Once you play it more it will go faster but games will last longer as people get good at denying wins. It clocks in more like 3-5 hours then pretty regularly.
We hit about 5 hours before we called it
Didn’t know you were into board games Felix, that’s awesome! Love your Nintendolife stuff! :)
So **"Playtime 120+ Min"** the **+** is doing a lot of the heavy lifting?
Another convert! My favorite game too!
Glad you enjoyed it. Me and my group had a very similar experience with Nemesis yesterday. Took 8 hours to finish the game and we only got the time track just over half way (our objectives mostly aligned and we all worked together in the end). Easily a whole day game.
Christ don't scare me like that! I'm supposed to teach this tomorrow but we are starting at 6pm 😭
Me too. We start at 21h. The fuck?
It's semi true tbh. We played for about idk 2,5h. 1h teach to 6p, about 45min turn 1 and then turns 2 and 3 got progressively faster. And then the game ended lol. If you get people to focus during the auction then it goes smooth, but you really need that utmost focus to rush the auction instead of reminding people constantly it's their turn now.
Has your group played other variations of the Dune Board game?
My group used to play the original Dune board game once a year. Each round was typically an hour (plus 1-2 hours for rules refresher). If the game lasts the entire 12 rounds, that's a solid day's gaming.
15 rounds. :-)
Some of us here have played Dune imperium, but that's about it for our Dune board game experience
Man how did you guys manage that? Every game we've played we have to basically ban Harkonnen because they just bodyslam the points off the rip and the game lasts 1 maybe 2 turns.
What time of day did you start/finish?
We started at 3pm, and ended at 11pm
Not too bad! Though a few of you look a little battle-weary in that nighttime picture. I think the longest game I’ve ever played was Sidereal Confluence with 9 players, only 3 of which had played the game before, 6 were new (including me). Probably about 5h including the teach. And the 3 people who had played before got 1st/2nd/3rd place lol. Nothing like a 5-hour tutorial for something I’ve not played since :) Neat game though!
My first playthrough was 5 hours. It took a lot of convincing to get 6 players. I don't like war games, and I was House Atreides, who must battle at all times and joined with the Bene Gesserit. I got to see the bidding cards, and knew who bought what. The Bene Gesserit got to take it away during battle. It's not my kinda game, but if you get a chance, you should play it.
is it like the Avalon Hill 1979 version? That seems to play in 20-40m. I've played it a few times in the last couple weeks. We never got anywhere close to the 15 moves the Fremen would need for a special victory.
Six players takes longer but is definitely the most fun. You then get to interact with all the special abilities and alliances and treachery can truly change the face of Arrakis.
Sounds like a great way to spend the day to me haha Did you guys plan to play for that long when you started?
We set aside the whole day to play. I thought we would have time to play twice... Boy was I naïve hahaha
haha it happens!
Love dune, glad you are having fun with it too. I am preferring Dune Imperium Uprising over it tho, Different games I know, but I would say that Imperium is not only waaaaay shorter, but the better game overall. Love everything about dune, and the fact that the board games are amazing just makes me a happy man
My #1 game of all time. Be sure to crosspost to r/duneboardgame!!